The Slow Midnight on Cypress Avenue

By Mike Figliola

The three-part book—broken into Morning, Afternoon, and Night—introduces you to the irregular regulars of the human race.

There is the soft and strange relationship between the eccentric Samuel Jean and a young girl of Puerto Rican descent named Desponda “Dezzy” Rivera. There’s “Old” Goldie Samuels, a washed-up relic who spends her days spinning yarns and getting free drinks at the local liquor store. But the story is truly centered on Corporal Benjamin Zogby, a veteran who spends his days alone on his stoop watching the bus go by and wishing his love would return to him. It’s his tragic fate that sends the avenue and the other inhabitants you’ll meet—Earl the fisherman, Father John White, among others—into an unstoppable tailspin toward unexpected change and inner destruction.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Permuted
• Release date: Aug 4, 2020
• ISBN: 9781682619209

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A PERMUTED PRESS BOOK

ISBN: 978-1-68261-919-3

ISBN (eBook): 978-1-68261-920-9

The Slow Midnight on Cypress Avenue

© 2020 by Mike Figliola

All Rights Reserved

Cover art by Cody Corcoran

Author Photo and Cover Photo Photography by Mark Zustovich

Art Direction by Mike Figliola

This book is a work of fiction. People, places, events, and situations are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or historical events, is purely coincidental.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author and publisher.

Permuted Press, LLC

New York • Nashville

permutedpress.com

Published in the United States of America

CONTENTS

Book I: morning

Part 1: Mr. Jean

Part 2: A Girl Of Little Dreams

Part 3: A Morning With Goldie

Part 4: They Call Him Corporal Benjamin Zogby

Part 5: Sons

Part 6: They Break Our Legs And Give Us Crutches

Book II: Afternoon

Part 1: Daughters

Part 2: Salvation On Himrod Street

Part 3: Back At Nunny's

Part 4: Au Point Mort

Part 5: Evangeline

Part 6: War

Book III: night

Part 1: Stories From St. Nicholas Avenue

Part 2: How All Things Should End

Part 3: Eliminent

Part 4: Nunny’s III

Part 5: She Calls Herself Betty

Part 6: The Slow Midnight

Acknowledgments 

About The Author

BOOK I

*MORNING*

PART 1

MR. JEAN

I checked my watch. It was quarter past eight in the morning; another Sunday on Cypress Avenue.

"Dezzy! Dezzy baby! Bring me some wine. And the radio! The portable radio on my bookshelf. Also my reading glasses and if you can find it, a Weekly World News paper, one of the old ones I have stashed next to my couch in the wicker basket. The one with Bat Boy and Elvis on the cover."

I turned and looked straight up at my apartment window. It was closed with the drapes drawn.

Surely she will hear me.

No response. Just a long dead silence. Dezzy’s usual horseshit.

"Dezzy honey, did you hear me? I need my portable radio—on the bookshelf. Also the reading glasses and the Weekly World News with Bat Boy and Elvis. And wine, just a cup or two—oh, just bring the bottle. Thank you honey, I am on the stoop!"

The wind kicked up a little. Smelled like rain. Hot summer rain. Not the cleansing kind. It was a typical sort of rain that readily fell over Ridgewood.

Sam, the window is closed, she can’t hear you. Why don’t you get the stuff yourself?

Dezzy—Dezzy baby!

Would you stop yelling? It’s eight o’clock in the morning! I knew that voice. It was Fran; fat old Fran. She spent her time preaching to the people in this neighborhood almost as much as the southern pastor at St. Aloysius Church.

And people are on their way to church too, Samuel, for goodness’ sakes!

Fran was the superintendent of our apartment building. The role had gone to her fat head and she wielded the broom with which she swept our hallway with an iron fist. She was one of the changeless and useless faces in the neighborhood. They were everywhere and usually I wouldn’t respond to her or anyone. It was a waste of time. Fran was in luck, though; Dezzy wasn’t awake yet and I had time to waste.

It’s almost eight thirty. They are all already at church. Why don’t you mind your own business and go floss your false teeth?

She ignored my insult and went on: "Plus, it’s going to rain, you fool. And why don’t you go inside and read your magazine and drink your wine and let that poor girl sleep. It’s eight o’clock in the morning!"

Bah! Dezzy! DEZZY!!! I yelled louder this time, like Ralph Kramden yelling upstairs to Ed Norton. I never did quite sound like Ralph, though. I was a blowhard with no blow.

Dezzy!!

Still weak. My brother Harold had a little more growl when he reached down into his gut—a gut mostly full of scotch. His bark still fell short. Harold knew why. I told him regularly: there is never going to be another Jackie Gleason. That type of man is dead and buried. Harold would scoff and yell louder. No dice. I reminded Harold that Jackie Gleason was poor and unassuming as Ralph Kramden, but sad and corrupt as Maish Rennick; the Great One himself born and bred in Brooklyn just like us and only five miles or so from here. All that laughing and life, echoed into the walls and saturated into the streets, now paved and tarred over by time. Seems like forever ago, beyond yesteryear. Harold is dead now. I wish he weren’t.

My brother Harold was born a day after I was, only a year later: July the ninth, 1945. I hate thinking about birthdays. Birth-deaths are more like it. It was me and Harold for as long as I can remember living in or around the six to eight family apartment buildings on Cypress Avenue. Our feet walked the half-paved/half-cobblestone streets in shoes that were stuffed with cardboard or two pair of socks when the holes got too big. We grew up in a hell that every other kid grew up in during the 1950s. That hell was put aside during long games of stickball in the middle of the street with an open Johnny pump firing onto our sunburned legs. We lived with my mother’s sister Betty at the time. Harold and I never knew our mother and father. They disappeared when Harold and I were very small. They weren’t married, which at the time was high treason in the middle of moral-majority America. I used to believe that my father had moved away into the Southwest to open a saloon with his brother. My aunt told us he wasn’t worth his salt anyway, being that only an idiot would get himself killed after not paying a gambling debt. Aunt Betty knew all about gambling so I believed her. But she changed the story of how he died throughout the years, which pissed Harold off. One time she said my father wasn’t even smart enough to make it to the Southwest and that he died with a rack of ribs in front of him somewhere near Kansas City. She also claimed he went to Mexico to become a cult leader and died after trying to convince a crowd he could walk on water. The stories of his departure usually came forth every year around the same time. Harold would stew. I would play stickball. That’s how we dealt with all of that. My aunt told us our mother never recovered from him leaving. She sat us down on the sofa and lowered the TV volume to tell us, calling her death onset rheumatic fever or some horseshit like that. Harold and I knew better. My mother would drink fevers away with gin and Bromo-Seltzer. In reality she walked in front of an oncoming southbound train at Lexington and 51st Street. No mother of ours was going to go out with a damn fever. No, she died the way we wanted her to. I just wish she had done it a little later on, when Harold was stronger and had his footing.

A drop of rain touched down right in front of my foot and broke my daydream. It directly hit an ant that was slowly dragging a leaf behind it. Too bad. It got worse, though; the ant fell over onto its back and another couple of droplets almost washed it away into the street. Too bad. Now its leaf would be doubly heavy with rain water. Poor bastard. But Fat Fran was right about me having to go inside to read and drink. There I would be: inside that old railroad apartment, like a box, like a coffin, to read and be alone. Dead and buried.

How many eight o’clock in the mornings do I have left, Fran? How many you give me? A year’s worth? Two years’ worth? I don’t know, Fran, but did you notice that this could be my last summer—last time on the stoop to read, have wine, hear the birds and watch the ants—like this poor guy, struggle to pull a leaf to the nest and wham!—struck down by a droplet of rain. This could be it for me, you see? And all I wanted, Fran, was Dezzy to bring me my things so I didn’t have to walk back up this damn stoop again! I wanted to put Fat in front of the Fran every time I said it. But I would reserve that for indoors.

Here you go, Mister Jean, said a soft, morning-cracked voice. Dezzy stood in the doorway of the apartment building holding the items I shouted for. She didn’t look so good: her eyes were slits, and her hair was arranged in a poorly made ponytail; however, she was half-smiling at me with dimples placed in the middle of her cheeks by the Lord. Is this all you wanted? Glasses, magazines, a radio, and wine?

I smiled and looked at Fran as if to say, You see? She cares about me. She heard me. Didn’t matter what time it was, she was going to bring me what I asked her for. I hated that fatty.

Fran shook her head and looked up to the sky. She was immediately splashed on the nose by an incoming raindrop.

No, Dezzy, I want to come inside. It’s going to rain. Can you help me in, baby? Good day, Fran. I smirked as Dezzy set aside my things and helped me back up the two cement stoop stairs and into the hallway.

Goodbye, Samuel, Fran snipped. And try to be a little quieter. It’s eight o’clock in the morning after all.

Dezzy turned and waved to her. Not a problem, Fran. I will take care of him and keep him quiet with wine and radios and whatever else he wants.

Try to be a little less fat, I mumbled.

What, Samuel? asked Fran.

I said, You see! That’s the respect there. That can only be taught, Fran! Dezzy was raised well! We closed the door behind us.

I don’t like talking to Fran, Dezzy, I whispered. She may seem harmless—even inviting—but you can never be sure of what’s underneath that muumuu she wears, you know?

Dezzy laughed and swung her ponytail around. There’s nothing under that muumuu that is sinister, Mister Jean.

Just fat.

Fat is harmless.

Dezzy’s eyes were opening now. They were bright, but they were supported by puffy black bags, markers that reminded me that she hadn’t slept right in the three years since she told me her father passed away. Her father hadn’t passed away in reality; he had left the family years ago. Dezzy mourned his leaving like a death. Her laugh and smile belied it. You would never know she had been worn down. Her full name was Desponda Ramona Rivera and she was born of a family full of internal warfare that lived a few apartment building doors down. That is all I knew. That is all I could handle.

You are naïve sometimes, Dezzy.

Naïve, Mister Jean?

Stop that ‘Mister Jean’ shit.

Why? I like calling you Mister Jean; it fits your pipe and beer and easy chair.

I am not smoking a pipe, sitting in my easy chair, or drinking beer right now, so cut it out.

A light fixture creaking above reminded me the ceiling fan was not installed properly. The blades spun wildly and loose, but they kept the entire apartment cool. And with the windows open at the start of a summer rain, the cross ventilation blew up any unsuspecting female visitor’s dress. Dezzy never wore dresses. That was too bad.

I just don’t see how I am naïve. Religious people are naïve. Taxpayers are naïve. Those who hand out spare change to tramps hanging around subway stations and think that money isn’t going directly to a wine bottle or a fully loaded syringe are naïve. I, Mister Jean, am none of that.

Cut out the ‘Mister Jean’ shit, I said. "Besides, I know you are none of that. You are very smart—smart as a whip who no man could ever take advantage of. You are a strong and independent type of gal full of prolific, tested wisdoms and well thought-out plans not of the Mice and Men variety. I paused and pointed to the kitchen. Now pour me some wine."

She blinked twice.

You can pour yourself some, too—there’s more than one clean glass in the cupboard.

I know. I did the dishes for you this morning.

That’s a good girl. Thanks. Two ice cubes, please.

I walked over to the open window in the bedroom before she could blink or answer or anything else and placed both my hands firmly on the frame. The once-clean sheer linen white drapes, now yellowed with the passage of time and perfumed tobacco smoke that spilled out of my evening pipes, were blowing in and out of the window like beckoning arms—the enchanted arms of Mr. Death.

Storm’s almost here, I whispered to myself. I used to love day storms. The freshness of rain, the solitude it unassumingly provided to me, the peace I found inside with the lights off but the grey storm-cloud-filtered sunlight filling the room, and the subsequent nap that might come with it. Those days I was able to share such things with another woman. No Mr. Jean or a Fat Fran in a muumuu dress. Just good old Samuel Jean (friends called me Sam or Snap when we were playing pool in the halls that dotted the many miles that Myrtle Avenue spanned from Brooklyn to Queens). The pool hall would be filled with guys looking for a fight or just looking to lay down a few bucks for a cream soda and low wager. And I would greet them both.

Here’s how it would go down:

I would stand at the foot of the table, sip the cream soda and scotch, slam down a few bills, match my good eye up to the green felt and aim my lucky stick at that white hot cue ball. The boys watched. The girls watched. The barkeep counted the day’s keep with one eye and watched me out of his other. Outside the rain would be washing down, cooling the summer streets and streaking across the front glass of the pool hall. Juke roared Harlem-born jazz and bop in a never-ending loop. And at the other end of the table would stand a red-haired big-bosomed baby staring straight at me with an Alice Kramden smile. It was Goldie Samuels. She never wavered, just watched and waited for that cue ball to deliver a devastating blow to the boy’s hopes on the table. She knew it would happen. She let them know by paying them no mind and waiting for me, for my shot, for my moment to sink that last striped billiard ball in the corner pocket, take the pot of cash, then deliver a dinner of steak, mash, and plenty of beer. The boys would yell Come on, Snap! You ain’t got it this time, Snap. But that is the last sound anyone would hear until my ball fired off the end of my cue stick and smacked straight into the others already deposited in that pocket. After a few handshakes, victory marches, and cocktails, we mad-dashed through the rain back to her apartment—a railroad on the edge of Fresh Pond Road and Myrtle—and crashed into her unmade Murphy bed. But before the broad stroke of lovemaking night, she’d stand up and fling wide open the window that faced the street—and the rain-born breeze would blow her hair and the soft drapes and her Bettie Page dress everywhere. We never did care.

And she never called me Mr. Jean.

A hand gently grabbed my shoulder.

Here’s your wine, Mister Jean.

I turned around, startled out of my yesteryear fantasy to see Dezzy with a glass in her hand. It was filled with wine and two ice cubes.

Thank you, Dezzy. I think I’ll have my pipe and go sit in my easy chair now.

PART 2

A GIRL OF LITTLE DREAMS

I wonder what makes old men sadder: the loss of a dog or the loss of their lady? Mr. Jean lost both between here and there over the years; at least I think he did. Now he is sad again, sitting in that easy chair, silent and alone. But I wonder if it’s losing the wag of the dog’s tail or the shake of his old woman’s ass that saddens him more. Perhaps it is neither; perhaps it’s the routine of it all. I can imagine Mr. Jean in those same pajamas day in and day out, taking pisses and craps and then cooking the same sardine-and-capers sandwich over a nonstick pan Fran bought for him one Christmas. Then me coming by, doing his dishes, hearing him call Fran fat until he gets sad again. But what was it? Was it about his dog or his lady? Who has time to figure such things out anyway?

Okay, Mister Jean, I’m gonna get going. Enjoy your pipes and wines and magazines. No answer. No matter. I grab a handful of change sitting on the kitchen counter and leave through the front door, pull it closed, fix my bra, smell my breath in my hand, and sneak slowly down the stairs past Fran’s apartment to the yellow-lit hallway. Thank god no one is on the pay phone. The day is young. And so am I. Pip is sure to be up now. I count the change out and place the coins in the slot.

BRRRNG BRRRNG

Hello.

Pip, it’s Dezzy.

Same spot, hun?

How long?

Ten minutes.

Don’t make me wait too long.

Ten freakin’ minutes, I said.

"Can we go for a ride